Liberations
by Rayfan
Summary: The effects of war on one's life and conscience. Story about half done, more to follow.
1. Default Chapter

A/N: An old story that I figured somebody somewhere might get something out of, so here it is. Although it was inspired by the Star Trek characters and universe, it could take place almost anywhere. If some of these folks seem a little out of character, think of the pressure they're under.

I can't list copyrights, because to be honest I have no idea who owns Star Trek these days. However, the main characters and setting are not mine. Some incidental characters were made by me, but all I really take credit for is the plot and storytelling.

* * *

**LIBERATIONS  
Chapter 1**

About the time that the dispatches stopped arriving, the hints of a change in Spock became too obvious to ignore.

He went about his tasks in his usual way, efficiently; but that little extra charge of pedantic enthusiasm had evaporated. Not suddenly, not at all suddenly – but Kirk had been, and still was, preoccupied. All the same, noticing such things was part of his responsibility as captain of the Federation Starship USS Enterprise.

He decided to speak to his first officer one day when his unease finally overcame a certain deep reluctance of which he was hardly aware.

"Spock, you know Starfleet hasn't contacted us in days. Why do you sit here? Leave the equipment on automatic – when a message comes in, it'll alert you instantly. There's no need for you to spend all your off-duty hours on the bridge."

Spock continued to gaze down at the white button that would flash if a message on the right wavelength came in.

"Spock – wh-what are you waiting here for?"

"I want news of the progress of the war."

"There is no war! Nobody's declared war!"

"'The Federation hasn't. Yet. They will. They'll have to. They should have long ago. It should never have come to be necessary. It–" Spock shut his mouth, his eyes, for a moment.

As Kirk struggled to quell it, the guilt in his stomach changed to rage.

"Mr. Spock, there is no war. Starfleet has sent no indication that there will be. It is not up to you or me to speculate on the matter. Your actions and your talk are both out of line – you are not far from treason, First Officer. Your tour of duty starts at 0800 hours; until then you are to remain in your quarters. There'll be no more of this haunting Communications. Now get out of here."

Spock swivelled and from his seat gave Kirk a long, thorough – insubordinately unaggressive, quintessentially Vulcan stare. Then he rose. He left the bridge. Kirk wanted to kick him, though he furiously wanted even more to kick himself.

* * *

When, precisely on time, Spock returned to the bridge for his tour of duty, he showed no sign that any off-hours incident had ever occurred. The captain was relieved and further exasperated. 

"Captain Kirk, a communication from Starfleet–"

"Put it on the screen, Lieutenant!" commanded Spock before Kirk could open his mouth. Startled, Uhura obeyed.

The viewscreen bloated to display the familiar cast-brass features of Admiral Rotola.

"Captain Kirk, this is to notify you that your orders have been changed. You are to head to the Letmos system where you will pick up a diplomatic envoy to be taken to Pithicus X." There was a pause.

"–Acknowledged," Kirk barked. He was still overwhelmed by a tidal wave of relief, as a massive tension washed out of his muscles.

"Excuse me, Sir – First Officer Spock here," Spock said, stepping abruptly forward. "Sir, you are rerouting us away from a course that would have taken us near the Talosian system. May I ask why?"

"You may not, First Officer."

"Sir, why have we received no news of events on Talos and on Vulcan?"

"There's nothing to send news about! Kirk, your crew seem inclined to insubordination. Would you kindly see in the future to their proper understanding of discipline. Rendezvous with Letmos at Star Date 28:42; you will receive further orders then. Starfleet out." As Kirk opened his mouth to acknowledge, the Admiral dissolved to a sea of stars.

The captain turned slowly to face his first officer. The rest of the bridge glanced sidelong at them in covert fascination. Spock had become a pillar of stone.

"Mr. Spock, you are relieved of duty and confined to quarters until further notice."

Calmly the Vulcan walked to the door. Kirk burst out: "Just a moment!"

Spock halted and turned patiently to see what was the matter.

"You'll need an escort, Mr. Spock. You, guard, take him to his quarters."

Spock continued to pause, with a look of inquiry, as though he had no idea he had just received a deadly insult. Kirk remembered himself.

"Take him to his quarters!" They went out, leaving Kirk alone with his strange sick dread.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

That evening the captain invaded Spock in his quarters. He was determined to be reasonable.

"All right, Spock. You've fooled around enough. Tell me – now – what's on your mind."

"I cannot, Captain."

"And why not?"

"Apparently my thoughts would be construed as treason. I do not desire to face such an accusation."

"Look, man, this is off the record. Will you tell me why you've been making a fool of yourself and of me? What the hell's the matter with you?"

"–Don't you know?" Spock cried, and froze.

Kirk felt a sudden knife warn him that he did know.

"No," he growled.

Spock turned away. He paced to the chair by his desk, sat down, quietly took several slow breaths. Kirk watched him, fascinated; he had not often seen the Vulcan pushed so obviously close to showing some temper.

Spock laid his hands on the desk. "Tell me what disciplinary action you intend to take," he said.

"If you would only be reasonable, there'd be no need for disciplinary action of any sort."

Spock sighed irritably.

"Listen, Spock. I'm asking you as a friend, an old friend. Forget that petty nonsense about discipline. Just tell me what's on your mind."

The other man, whom he knew for a fact he _had_ known for a very long time, sent him a slow, searching look. Anguish struck Kirk as he realized that Spock was desperate enough to pass over his misgivings and speak the truth.

"Jim, I have to know what is happening on my planet. I sense, constantly, a pressure – it's partly telepathic, I am certain – Jim, why is nothing being done? Can they not learn from history? This situation has to be taken in hand before –" His voice fell away.

"Spock, we have our orders."

"Orders!" As if a foul obscenity. At that Kirk saw just how drastically natural law had been deposed.

"... I want to know," said Spock quietly, "what is being done about it."

"About..."

"About the non-existent events we all know are not taking place on Vulcan and in the regional systems."

"Look, Spock, for God's sake–"

"Of course _nothing_ is happening there!" Spock burst out. His hands clenched the edge of the plastic table until it started to bend. Kirk withstood his cold burning stare until he too felt twisted with pain. He turned to go.

Instantly Spock was beside him. A big hand seized his arm with almost the force the table had felt.

"You," breathed Spock, "you will either allow me to resign my commission, or you will convene an immediate court-martial and have me discharged. I am leaving this ship, Kirk."

"Like hell you are."

"I am going back to Vulcan."

"You can't go there! You wouldn't stand a–"

A pause.

"Why? Could something be happening on Vulcan?" Spock – crooned.

* * *

Purely by chance, they nabbed him in the hangar deck as he was about to make off with a shuttlecraft. (How he had escaped from the brig was a mystery.) Kirk found himself confronting again a man of stone.

"Stealing a shuttlecraft wouldn't have done you much good."

"I suppose not."

"You realize that you are building up offences that will lead to quite a severe penalty. ... And this is the culmination of your many years with Starfleet... and as my first officer."

The prisoner was silent.

"Spock, it didn't have to be this way."

"The turn of events is not my choice."

"How can you say that!"

He was oddly gentle. "Jim – you know what service has meant to me. But I must go home, I'll be needed. – And there is no guarantee that the Federation will enter on the right side of the war, when they finally do. I will not remain among enemies."

"Spock, I am not your enemy!"

"...But you are. You are. You'll find out."

He was put back in the brig under double guard, and warned that another escape attempt would earn him heavy sedation as well. He declared himself flattered by their confidence in his abilities, and became a paragon of docility. Left alone, he could be spied ceaselessly, relentlessly pacing his cell like a caught panther. Or crowding up to the shimmer of the cell door, to stand entranced for hours, though flirting with a heavy shock from contact with the force field. If spoken to, however, he was his most calmly unconcerned, even affable self.

The day after they reached Letmos, Spock vanished. Alerts sent throughout the star system, a combing of Letmos, and of the Enterprise itself, all failed to flush him. Kirk resigned himself; Spock had most likely "borrowed" a spacesuit and stowed away on board some outward-bound unmanned airless freighter. Bound, of course, for anywhere but Vulcan. By the time he was traced he would be somewhere else.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The Federation's cautious fencing with Talos (and Vulcan) continued. Still no official news was had of the goings-on on the planets in that area, although rumors naturally flourished. If by chance an official reference was made to the situation, it either revealed nothing or turned out to be blatantly false. Kirk, an automaton, tried to forget that he had ever had faith in the integrity of his government. Even more, he strove to forget that he had ever know any Vulcan, in particular one by the name of "Spock." The fugitive after whom he made routine inquiries was merely a faceless datum.

Two years later the war broke out.

It was now officially acknowledged (and one's displeasure thereat now officially condoned) that Vulcan had been attacked and almost overnight defeated by the Talosians some years back. What with both planets being members of the Federation, and Talos being of considerable economic importance as a supplier of precision industrial parts, the situation had previously been, diplomatically speaking, a little touchy. Vulcan, a planet with a highly educated population specializing in the most speculative branches of scientific theory, but relatively unconcerned with producing high technologies, was a more doubtful quality in the greater scheme of things.

On occasion during those years of official waffling prior to the war, threads had appeared that stood out in the pattern of interplanetary tensions gradually being woven. Once, for example, a commercial entertainment broadcast being seen simultaneously throughout most of the more advanced Federation systems, including on Earth, had been abruptly wiped out and replaced with the sombre face of a humanoid, apparently a Vulcan. He addressed his captive audience in Federation Standard for a few minutes before his unceremonious displacement by a "Please Stand By" signal. What he said in that brief time caused no end of trouble to the network. Outraged denunciations of bad taste, anger at a practical joke, fury at the interruption of a popular program were the main themes of the protests. There were also a few crank calls demanding to hear more, to hear truth; but gradually the public was placated and forgot the affair, except for the usual handful of malcontents.

Kirk, hearing about the scandal some months later, involuntarily demanded to know who the Vulcan had been. No one had any idea.

But now, with the formal declaration of war, this musty incident was resurrected and used as an inspiring example of the indomitable spirit of the oppressed. Names and histories of the quietly impassioned forgotten face sprang up everywhere, all pure fiction. And the one phrase he had uttered that was still agreed upon by all authorities, was trumpeted everywhere now as a rallying cry: "You must learn the truth!" (There was a little more – "and in all conscience act upon it" – but that made the slogan much too unwieldy.)

This truth which all hungered to know was not easy to come by. The Talos-conquered planets, of which there were now quite a group, had been sealed off. No visitors were permitted; any unauthorized intruder was summarily classed as a spy and interned on the planet. "Interned where and how?" was an interesting question (numerous reporters, adventurers, family relations, and actual spies had vanished over the years); gossip had plenty of speculation, ranging from the horrible to the unspeakable, but nothing could be verified.

"It is a sad comment upon our vaunted technology," remarked an Earth politician well known for the profundity of his thought, "that even with the most modern of equipment we are unable to establish communication with the enemy."

* * *

After some fumbling, the war took off in earnest. Captain Kirk, whose ship the Enterprise had been sent for reconnaissance/skirmish work pending a large confrontation, had long ago ceased to disturb himself over the rights and wrongs of politics. His duty, thank God, was clear; he was weary of asking questions. After so much doubt, it was stimulating, a release to the spirit, to throw oneself into combat and damn all but destruction! He brightened up quite a bit during the first few months of action. The only fly in this soothing ointment was his medical officer, Dr. McCoy, who since Spock had left had run rampant, expanding his oratory until everyone on board was thoroughly fed up of his profundities. The good doctor had not lost his old habit of asking annoying questions – a habit he had shared with Spock, even if the questions they asked usually were meant to annoy each other. It was only after the departure of his former First Officer that Kirk realized how much he'd needed them both; to have one to play off the other and keep the two of them out of his hair. In any case, by the time the war started, McCoy had metamorphosed into a staunch partisan of Vulcans in general and Spock in particular. The declaration of war, supporting him as it did, left him at an all too temporary loss.

The war irked McCoy, as it required him to be constantly patching up messy injuries on people who would promptly go and get themselves wounded again, making the whole affair rather a waste of time. Even more, he loathed the drudgery of perpetually cranking out one death certificate after another. He began to rail against humanoid inhumanity to humanoid, and spent most of his meagre spare time entangling the reluctant Kirk in political debates.

"You want to know why we're fighting this war?" ("No," sighed Kirk.) "Because the damn Federation is only united in name. What about all that crap we used to hear about policing the members? About maintaining internal peace at all costs? All those fine words about ensuring civil rights for every individual on every planet? Since when have the Aveltavians had civil rights to speak of? Nobody hears about them, they're just primitives on a primitive resources mine. Who cares if they're still a republic? The Vulcans, now, they lost their civil rights long before this war began, long before there was even a question of pretending it was legal to declare war on Talos in the first place. I ask you, _how_ can we declare war on a Federation member? It's outrageous. Oh, sure, it had to be done. But why? Because the Federation didn't do its job when it still had the chance, that's why. Because they let Talos get away with attacking Vulcan – one of the oldest members of the Federation, mind you! Just let them take over an entire planet, remove it from circulation, no one even knows how – though of course the Vulcans believe in non-aggression, they wouldn't have any preparation for war – which makes it even worse – an illegal, immoral, unforgivable assault on the freedom of a fellow Federation member, and the Federation looks the other way. How come? Can you tell me how come? Is it because Talos had money clout? Is it because nobody very much likes the Vulcans? Because they don't like war and they're _weird?_ Is it because the Federation Assembly was too occupied with redecorating its apartments and squabbling over ambassadors' nameplates to bother about some minor inter-system fuss–"

"Bones," said Kirk, "Shut up. Shut up now. If you don't shut up, without another word, you're going to spend the night in the brig. And from there I'll ship you to the Assembly itself, where you might find a more appreciative audience – I've had enough."

"Fine, fine, be a mindless catspaw–"

"McCoy!"

"Don't you _care?"_

"Don't I _care?_ It's not my business to care! Goddammit, Bones, I _am_ a senior Starfleet officer, after all! What do you want me to do, defect? Do you think that we're on the wrong side in the war? Maybe we shouldn't be fighting at all? Peace at any price maybe we should let the Talosians take over the entire Federation, is that what you want?"

"Now I didn't say–"

"If you didn't, it's about the only thing you haven't said!"

"Are you calling me a traitor?"

"No. I'm calling you a gnat. Now shut up."

"A _what?"_

"Shut up! Where were you when this mess was brewing? Arguing idiocies with Spock! At least he tried to do something about it!"

"I never argued with Spock in my–"

"And he's probably dead by now, died for the satisfaction of his damned conscience – Just shut up, McCoy! Shut up!"

"Now look, Jim, don't get excited."

"The thought of him shot at dawn in some dingy prison yard, when he might still be alive and useful – oh, Christ, these people with consciences! As for me, I follow orders. And I'll accomplish a hell of a lot more by doing that than he ever could by charging off like a goddam Don Quixote. Don't you talk to me about the Federation. The Assembly isn't Olympus, but they're the best we've got. What if they're only human and stupid and cowardly like the rest of us? Except for the damned flaming knights who think they can change the course of history by galloping at windmills, like that damned Vulcan, that damned Spock..."

McCoy gave him a long look. "I see... I see. I understand. Jim – I'm sorry."

"You understand, do you really? Never mind. Just please, for God's sake, McCoy, _for God's sake_–" He gestured helplessly. "_Don't."_


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

It was popularly claimed that Talosians "did not take prisoners." (That is, they didn't allow any enemy combatants to survive a battle.) This was probably untrue. The Federation did take prisoners – or would have, but for the Talosians' unflattering preference for suicide over capture. Thus, Kirk was greatly pleased when a skirmish finally yielded him seven prisoners, five crewmembers and two senior officers from the destroyed warship. They were a stiff lot.

"You realize," stated the most senior, "that we only permitted ourselves to be captured through the failure of our ship's self-destruct unit. You'll get nothing out of us. We don't deal with barbarians."

Other members of the crew were a better bet. Particularly the youngest, a slight, tremulous, unseasoned boy. His nerve had already been shattered by the long strain of service: his first separation from home, and that by thousands of parsecs; the nightmare rumors; the tension of waiting for battle and the terror of the battles themselves; and then, he had been injured during capture. It only took a few judicious hints, and a small sample, and he was writhing, hysterically tongue-tied, nearly psychotic. He talked; indeed, he babbled.

"We're not supposed to tell you anything, but they told us you were monsters, they said we had to die rather than be taken or we'd be tortured, we're not to talk, the leader said so, told me personally by radio, please don't hurt me anymore, please, I don't care what the leader wants any more, he can't have known what it's like to be shot at, to kill men – I didn't want to, we blew up a ship, I saw it crack open in space and bodies – please, I'm sorry, I didn't want to, nobody wants to except the leader, and please, it's not my fault, it's not my–"

As McCoy commented, "The war'll be over in no time. If they're sending children like that out to fight, they haven't just scraped the bottom of the barrel, they've overturned it."

The prisoner told them that all Talos-conquered planets had been turned into vast slave outfits, that the slave labor powered the war, that resistance was met by torture and incarceration in enormous prison camps. This confirmed persistent rumors – but then, it was after all pretty standard procedure. The boy added that, officially, such camps didn't exist, but he knew about them, having been involved in shipping groups of prisoners around on several planets before he was sent into active space service. He had guarded prisoners on Talos itself, on Corduban, Fresingjo, and on Vulcan.

But he couldn't tell Kirk anything about individual Vulcans. They all looked the same to him.

And at this point he began to cry violently; they couldn't get another word out of him. McCoy took him to Sickbay, daring anyone to lay so much as a finger on the poor kid. "Treating this thing like a soldier would be making a farce of the whole war," he said. Kirk, with a shrug, had to agree.

"You still call this an 'unjust' war?" he sarcastically asked McCoy.

"I suppose you think there's such a thing as a 'just' one?"


End file.
